


An eventful evening

by lollipop666



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Implied/Referenced Abuse, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-18
Updated: 2018-08-18
Packaged: 2019-06-29 03:21:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,377
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15720948
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lollipop666/pseuds/lollipop666
Summary: You couldn’t believe that you had just kidnapped your neighbor. This was definitely not what you had planned to do for your evening, not even remotely close.Maybe all of this wouldn’t have happened if you had taken out your trash regularly instead of letting it stack up.





	An eventful evening

**Author's Note:**

  * For [mtjester](https://archiveofourown.org/users/mtjester/gifts).



> hi! it's the first fic i post here!! it was inspired by mtjester's fic Paper-thin Walls, which is just amazing! so it's not packed with romance there are hints here and there but maybe i'll write a sequel, maybe not!

You couldn’t believe that you had just kidnapped your neighbor. This was definitely not what you had planned to do for your evening, not even remotely close.  
Maybe all of this wouldn’t have happened if you had taken out your trash regularly instead of letting it stack up.

Well, “kidnapping” was a strong word, you think. After all, he hadn’t resisted when you took his hand in yours, and wheeled yourself down the corridor as fast as you could just after you knocked over his brother with a trash bag that could have been weighting forty pounds. You didn’t know why you suddenly got the impulse but before you had the time to regret it he freed himself from your grasp and started pushing you faster and faster, not slowing down even when you arrived at the old very creaky and not at all secure ramp, you remembered thinking that you were going to fall numerous time but he seemed to handle the sharp-turns perfectly. You hadn’t gone that fast since you last participated in the makeshift wheelchair racing competitions your brother would organize before you moved out. You hadn’t realized just how much you actually missed this sensation until earlier that day, although in your memories you were the one controlling the speed and direction of your wheelchair and you don’t remember being scared of falling to your death, needless to say it was way more fun in your memories. 

As soon as you got out of the apartment complex, you pointed to him your brother’s car, hoping that he would be able to drive. You thought that maybe you should have planned your escape better. The car was unlocked as usual, it was so old and ramshackle that your brother didn’t have to worry about leaving his keys inside. You were still trying to decide how you would tell your brother that you would be borrowing his car for a while. You were sure that he wouldn’t mind that much, at least you hoped so. 

With how much Dave had been glancing around nervously since he decided to run from his brother, you knew that you didn’t have much of time, you entered the car and nearly threw your wheelchair inside, just to see that he was still fumbling with the key. He was panting and sweating, you were too. His hands where shaky, probably because of the adrenaline.

It was the first time that you saw him this disheveled, not in the sense that it was the first time that you saw him beaten up and bloodied, his clothes and skin dirty with dust, but his hair somehow still perfectly well-groomed. It was a habitual sight, if you believed what was said and, well, what you saw and heard through the paper-thin walls during the couple of weeks you started to live there. Still he always had this perfectly composed face which made it seem that it was normal that his brother beat him up on the rooftop at least twice a week. His poker face was so convincing that you almost started to believe it too. Now though you could read anxiousness and frustration on his face and you’re not really sure but, you think that adrenaline might not be the only reason he was shaking. 

You exited the parking lot. You didn’t say anything about him driving with his sunglasses on when it was night because it seemed like the kind of things he would do and somehow be able to pull off. 

Now that you had had enough time to think you realized just how much you had to idea what to do, you could ask Gamzee to house you for sometimes or even to Aradia or even Terezi, although the prospect didn’t please you since it meant that you would have more chance to cross path with Vriska. You didn’t know if he would accept and even then he didn’t have any of his belongings with him. You probably made things worse for him, this was probably why Vriska said that you should let other people do the thinking for you. You started nervously chewing on your nails and looked at him from the corner of your eye. He didn’t look angry, but his face never lets out any emotions so you couldn’t assume anything. 

You couldn’t believe what you had just done, that you had just ran away from Bro. You couldn’t believe what your neighbor had done either, he just hit him with a fucking trash bag and knocked him over, just fucking knocked him over, something you hadn’t been able to do ever, you saw Bro fall on the ground for the first time in your entire life and you didn’t know how to react to that. You wouldn’t have thought that your neighbor, your own fucking neighbor, the one you can hear sing songs from Peter Pan every now and then would be the one to knock bro right on his ass, right in front of your own two eyes. And as if this situation wasn’t already crazy he then just fucking took your hand and escaped with you like some sort of Disney prince coming out of a dungeon, the princess in his arms ready to be taken to her new life without having to worry about the cruel and evil dragon or whatever. This had got to be the most and least cliché shit that ever happened to you and in the most ironic way possible. 

You were driving to god knows where, with a dude you barely even knew, to do whoever the fuck knows and with no money. This had got to be the most piss poor plan you had ever seen, glancing at him you could see that he didn’t know what to do next either, you had to stifle a frustrated groan. 

And yet you were still driving and you didn’t regret it one bit, even if you knew that it would be hell when you actually came back, Bro wouldn’t say anything, but you would feel it in his actions, hell maybe he’d decide to call you up to the roof every day or pull out the same stunt as today and decide that one dose of ass-whopping wasn’t enough anymore and that you needed to go to the process of getting your ass handed to you at least twice a day. Maybe you running away proved his point.  
You waved the thought away and glanced at your neighbor, he was chewing on his nails nervously and you could easily read the anxiety and doubts in his face, his eyebrows were knitted together and you could tell that he was trying to find something to say. He would take sharp intakes of breath and open his mouth just to let the sentence die in his throat and leave room to a little sigh. He was like an open book. You don’t understand why this apparently harmless dude involved himself in your business like this, he probably didn’t even know you name, it annoyed you to no end. Right now neither of you could go back home, you’d probably have to go to a shitty motel and then have to build up enough courage to crawl back home and face Bro tomorrow, you knew that you were going to get fucking destroyed on the roof later but you couldn’t imagine what would happen to him. 

The thought of bro killing him rapidly brushed the back of your mind, but you disregarded it, there was no way he would do that. 

You wished you had sounded more convincing in your head.

You kept a straight face. You weren’t thinking coherently. You looked at him again and he was still in deep thoughts, he met your gaze several but he probably didn’t know it because of the sunglasses. Finally his whole face lit up, his eyes widened and his mouth formed a little “o”. You guessed that he had found something to say. You were waiting for him to hit you with it.

“Uhh, Dave” he started, losing immediately any form or excitement when his voice cracked, you took note of the fact that he did know your name, and you felt shitty because you didn’t know his, “If we continue to go straight like this, we’ll pass in front of a bar, and uhh it belongs to a friend of mine, and, we could” he started stumbling through his words “we could probably go there for now, and talk about…”

His voice trickled back to silence, your lack of reaction probably crushing any last bit of bravado he had. 

He slumped back in his seat and you had the distinct impression that you had kicked a puppy. It was too late to respond now, though. 

You remember that he introduced himself to you once, he started out cheery and you remember that his face quickly decomposed when he saw the numerous bruises on your face and arms and the sword on your shoulder, he looked at you for several second, confused before tentatively asking if you needed a band aid or something else, at this point you had already been subjected to his perfect reenacting of Peter Pan so, like an asshole, you responded that you weren’t the type of person who rocked Tinkerbell band aids and you left him blushing in embarrassment, having probably ruined this poor sap’s day, when all he did was saying hello and showing understandable concern for you. You probably left thinking that you were one of the coolest motherfucker alive too. You didn’t even bother to remember his name. 

Still, why in the fuck did he decide to get his nose right into your business like that?

You both traveled in awkward silence. 

“The Dolorosa’s Bite,” you heard he said, “is that the bar?”

Dave's voice startled you.

You were still deep in thought, trying to find a way to somehow talk to him.

“Wha- oh! Yes! It’s the bar I’m talking about!” you said, your voice louder than you expected it to be.

He parked and exited the car. He also took the time to help you get in your wheelchair. As you were approaching the entrance, you got anxious but Dave walked without showing any kind of discomfort, and the anxiety disappeared, you followed right behind him. 

As usual Porrim was at the bar, you could see her discuss with habitual customers. She greeted you with a warm smile and you felt all the tension in your body relax; this was a nice change of pace. You reciprocated her greeting with a smile of your own and a wave. She looked at Dave beside you and then back at you, sighed, probably making incorrect assumptions from the situation, but at least you knew that she would be able to provide shelter for the night. You quickly went over and made the presentation, Dave only responded to Porrim’s greeting with a nod and a small hand motion. 

You made yourself comfortable in one of the small, private booth. Dave was following behind you, his hands in his pocket. He plopped down on the opposite side of you and raised a single eyebrow. 

You could see that he was trying to keep his face straight, to smooth out the wrinkles formed between his eyebrows, to keep his nose from flaring and his teeth from clenching.

“So?” he asked his neutral demeanor cracking.

You contemplated apologizing but you weren't sure if that was what he wanted to hear right now. 

“Uh-,” 

He did not let you finish.

“What now? We live happily ever after far from my life of rooftop ass-whooping, never to return to our awful, apartment lot or should I say the fucking Evil Queen’s castle in this motherfucking fairy tale you’ve decided to play the lead in by saving poor old me, the fucking damsel in distress now forever indebted to you and who will now fall right into your fucking arms like any good Disney princess and become free of all of my worries because our love is that fucking magical, because of course how could the poor princess not fall in love with the courageous prince? By slaying the beast, or I guess the evil fucking queen the prince also caught the worst fucking curse on him that will come and bite him in the ass later, as the fucking queen isn’t dead and he, too, lived in the evil castle and doesn’t have anywhere else to go; but sure for now let’s just enjoy ourselves in our temporary dwarf safe house and have mad, crazy passionate sex-”

“Uh, wha-” 

“-That will leave completely breathless and my throat sore because of how much I screamed your name-”

“Okay, maybe you need to stop, this, I'm not comfortable with-”

“because it was the first time in my entire fucking life that I felt so loved, ignoring the fucking forest that is on fire and the looming threat of death in the near future but all because mister prince over here just couldn’t keep it in his pants when he saw my beautifully bruised face and was overcome with raw lust so strong that h-”  
“Ok that, is not what happened, at all,”

“Then WHY? Why the motherfucking fuck would you do that?” He was shaking in anger, he sneered, a fake smirk on his face “Because to me it seems to me that mister over there” he pointed at you, “have a fucking huge boner for me!” 

“What? No! I, this isn’t, I’m not, I’m not trying to hit on you,” you say as you understood something, “I’m not the kind of person that hits on people already in a relationship! I have a-” thoughts of Vriska fill your mind and you quickly shake your head and try your best not to grimace, “ I had-, no yes I’m single but, I’m not, I mean I’m not hitting on you, that clearly isn’t how exactly you, so to speak, sweep someone off their feet” you say maintaining eye contact, hoping to clear the misunderstanding and to cut the tension with a little humor.

It didn’t go as you thought it would go, Dave’s poker face was completely obliterated to reveal pure and utter confusion. He just slumped down back on his chair suddenly drained. Finally he started laughing, slow and tired.

“ Whom am I even dating ? I’m genuinely curious.”

Hm. Okay. Maybe he wasn’t in a relationship.

“Uh, John? Or I don’t know if that’s his name but? Uh, maybe John not even a “he” and I didn’t try to spy on your conversations, um, it’s just that sometimes you just talk really loudly of your, uh-”

You couldn’t believe what you just heard, never mind that he still hadn't told you why he hit your brother with a trash bag nearly as big as a fucking car, nevermind that you would be thoroughly fucked when you came back, this was goddamn hilarious and you knew you couldn’t stop yourself from laughing, you needed to tell everything to John later, hell to Jade too, maybe not to Rose unless you wanted to give her more material to psycho-analyze you, today had been a fucking day, but this, this just won the fucking cake, you were searching in your mind for which of your conversations with John would have lead the guy into thinking that the two of you were fucking dating each other, or more like you already had several in mind, and every one of them are so fucking full of sexual innuendos that, taken out of context, would leave anyone thinking that you and John were dating or at least having crazy wild sex together, it explained the gay bar/restaurant. 

You couldn’t stop laughing this guy (you were starting to low-key be bothered by the fact that you couldn’t remember his name, you thought it was maybe Trevor? You knew it started with a “T” but couldn’t for the life of you remember the rest) probably thought that your sex life was crazier than any of the protagonists of Rose’s library and god that’s saying a lot.

He was looking at you with something close to surprise but you knew he was embarrassed to have made this error, still you could see that he was trying very hard and failing to stop himself from smiling with you, he seemed like the kind of guy who smiled a lot and for nothing so this was probably going against his nature. 

“Look,” you finally managed to say, “I'm not even-”

“Glad to see that the mood lightened here.” Porrim, the lesbian from before, said with a smile while putting two plates on the table. 

You hadn’t seen her approach but her sudden appearance didn't startle you like it usually did with your brother, there was something reassuring about the way she looked at you, actually there was something reassuring with everything about this place, but fuck if you were about to admit it to yourself. Today had been a day and you were honestly tired of having to be confronted with things you were desperately trying to not think about. 

“When you finish eating Tavros will show you where you can clean up,”

You immediately perked up at the name, stopping yourself from repeating it out loud, it was original but it fitted him.

“There is still an unoccupied room upstairs, you can stay there for a while.”

You just nodded and mouthed an embarrassed “thanks”, there shouldn't be any reason for you to be this intimidated by her, true she was hot in a MILF kind of way, but you weren't the type to get jittery around beautiful women, true she had arms that could probably crush a person's head like it was a mere egg, but then again you weren't scrawny either, it wasn't the tattoos, on her they looked classy and refined. You were sure that if you sent a picture of her to Rose she would instantly go into a coma, she would probably thank you too.

“Will you also be staying Tavros?”

“Oh! Yeah, uh, there are some, um, complications” he mumbled, his voice becoming higher at the end of the sentence as if asking a question, “where we currently live so, yeah.”

“Rufioh knows you're here?”

You saw his face fall.

“Uh, not exactly? He isn't in the country right now, so he doesn't know, about our, our... situation.”

“I won't ask about this “situation” you do not seem to want to talk about,” she let out a small sigh, “but don't forget to call him later, if you're in any kind of danger you should talk to him. He'll be disappointed if you don't.”

“It's not, Porrim it's not like that, this is different.”

'Not like what?' you wanted to ask but you kept your mouth shut, just watching the scene.

“But, I'll call him later, promise. Maybe not tonight though.”

“Sure.” She said, patting his head.

She patted yours too before going back at the bar. You didn't know how you felt about it but you rolled with it. You picked up the fork you had in front of you and started eating while Tavros was making all kinds of faces, all conveyed indecision and despair. He wasn't paying attention to you anymore, he was completely stuck in his own head.

After the third bite of your steak, you finally had enough pity for him to get him out of his internal dilemma.

“So, you still haven't responded,”

“What?” he snapped back to reality.

“Why did you do it?” you said looking at your plate, fuck you were hungry, at this point you didn't care as much as earlier but you would still like to know.

“Oh, I don't really know, or, I mean, I know, but I don't think you'll like what I will say, maybe.”

You looked up, eyebrows lifting.

“Try me.”

“No? I, I could be wrong, and it could potentially make you angry, so, maybe, no?”

He was starting to get nervous and that made you even more curious

“What you're scared I'll cut you with my sword?” 

“Yes, that has definitely been one of my concerns, yes.” He confirmed, nodding.

“Wha-? Really?! Come on!” you say with a smirk “you see a guy sword-fighting with his brother a couple of times on the roof and you just assume that he just likes to stab people with it? That's just rude, man.”

“No, actually, I think that this is a pretty normal concern, if we take into consideration the situation as a whole.”

“I don't even have my sword on me, also every single one of my swords are just shitty pieces of shit that couldn't even cut a fly in half, that's how bad they are. Just tell me why, I won't even get angry.” At least, you think you wouldn't, it might just be the curiosity talking.

“Yeah,” he says, dragging out the word, “I guess, it's not that big of a deal, but you looked, um, how to say this, like you were very scared?” he paused waiting for your reaction, as you didn't say anything, he continued, “it looked like you wanted to run away, so, I guess my body moved on its own.”

You didn't know what you were expecting, but in any case his answer did not please you to say the least, you felt your jaw clench at what you knew wasn't an insult per se but still stroke a very sensitive chord within you.

Tavros shot a glance towards the other clients when he saw your face fall, seemingly ready to get the fuck out of here if you became too threatening. 

You didn't do anything, you kept your mouth stubbornly shut as you didn't trust what could accidentally get out of it. 

After a little bit of time passed where he was just watching you fume with an unsure expression on his face, Tavros finally exhaled and relaxed, seemingly finding a way of defusing the situation.

“Look, I don't mean-, look, there is no reason to feel ashamed because you were scared,” he quickly added as you were about to open your mouth, “as a person who has also been in a situation where going to the rooftop was a source of extreme stress and, uh, not happy memories-”

You let out a very unamused laugh.

“Oh, yeah?” you said with much more poison in your voice than you intended.

“-I related to your situation and-” he interrupted himself after processing your question, “yes, I mean that's how I ended up in a wheelchair,” he said in a very matter-of-fact tone, “so, I related to your situation as, I, also, had a day where I wanted to run away but couldn't-”

“Wait what?” 

“- of course I don't mean to say that our situations were exactly the same, as I didn't have, uh, sparring matches on the roof with my brother, it was with my ex-girlfriend, oh and I don't mean that we had sparring matches together, just that she was the source of my bad experience with rooftops or I guess falling off of them.” 

You didn't know what to say, you didn't know what to think actually, was he actually fucking with you? Did he actually get thrown out of a roof by his crazy ex-girlfriend, and 'girlfriend'? You promised yourself to stop with the assumptions for today.

He looked into space, mouth open and eyebrows furrowed, seemingly searching for his next words. 

“Ok, just let me start over-”

“No need, just, jesus, what the fuck? You are really telling me that you were thrown off of a roof by your girlfriend? Dude!”

“Well saying it like that over-simplifies things a lot, but yes.”

“What do you mean “over-simplifies things”? Are you telling me somehow that she threw you off without meaning to?”

“Oh, no no, she did want to throw me off, that's why she did it. It's the reasons behind it that is complicated to explain.”

“Are you,” you started bewildered, “are you actually telling me that it was justified?”

“Not 'justified'... just, I guess, understandable.”

“Oh my god, you are actually defending the person who threw you off of a roof.”

“I'm not, look, I'm not defending her, it's just complicated,”

“What's so complicated about her throwing you off of a roof?”

“Well, first you don't know the whole story, and second, I mean, that was a long time ago, we were what? Thirteen or something like that?”

“You know that it's still pretty fucked up right? You really have shitty luck to go and fall on a psycho this young. God I can't even imagine what she grew up to be!”

“Well, she isn't that bad I guess? She could be worst, I think she might be better than when we were little.”

“Wait a minute, you saw her again? More importantly, you consciously decided to interact with her again? If I were you I would have fucking ran.” You shook your head in amused disbelief before taking a sip of your drink.

“I think I should have done that.” 

“Yeah, you should have, what if she still had pictured of you hidden under her bed that she used as target practice? Tavros she could have stabbed you with a knife!”  
You felt his name roll out of your tongue, it was weird but not bad.

You could feel your face becoming sour as soon as the sentence came out of Dave's mouth, you instantly reached for your stomach as bad memories filled your mind.  
“Wait, did she actually stab you?”he asked, horrified “Christ, dude!”

You didn't really want to explain your whole experience with LARPing, or the fact that you also had been charging at her with a lance so you said nothing. You averted your gaze and suddenly the decoration of the room seemed new and unfamiliar to you.

“And you still tried to defend her?!”

“I think you are misunderstanding somehow, it's not that easy, and I'm not defending her.” you were growing more and more uncomfortable with this discussion, “look, it's, uh, it's like with your brother.”

“What about my brother?” he asked, on the defensive.

“Well, you know that what he does to you is objectively awful-”

“Okay, this is not the same thing-”

“Well, it's still pretty awful.”

“My brother never pushed me off the rooftop.” he protested weakly and not at all confidently which was uncharacteric of him.

“Vriska only stabbed me once, but more importantly who's defending who now?”

He ignored your question.

“You can't put my brother on the same level of your psycho ex, he is training me, preparing me for the real world and all that shit.”

“Uh, Vriska used to say that she did a lot of things, to make me physically and mentally stronger too and also I'm pretty sure the 'real world' doesn't involve sword as much as you think it does, in fact, I don't think that the average person uses swords anymore.”

He opened his mouth and then closed it seemingly not able to think of a come back. 

You felt a little bad, you didn't expect to hit bull's eye when you mentioned his brother. Actually, it was sad that he felt the same way about his brother than you feel about Vriska, you thought that maybe it was different, that maybe he did enjoy sword-fighting.  
You remember when you first saw him, you had a normal reaction, you were concerned and worried, but as the weeks passed it nearly became routine to see him up there on the roof, like “hey, here are those strange brothers again, they sure are eccentric.” it made you feel bad, especially if he really felt like you felt, like you sometimes still feel whenever she is mentioned.

It was hard not to try to justify Vriska's action, you didn't know why, but it was a thing you just did, Aradia helped you a lot with that and now you could recognize yourself doing it but it was still hard to stop sometimes. Somehow trying to justify it lessened the shame.  
The thought of calling Aradia later tonight crossed your mind but you knew she already had a lot to deal with since her accident, still it had been a while since the two of you last talked, maybe calling to see how she was doing was a good idea after all, you'd only mention what happened today in vague details and not talk about vague and distant menace your neighbor's brother could pose to you. You also really needed to call your bother.

You looked up at Dave and saw him in deep thoughts. He was frowning, and even though you couldn't see his eyes, you knew that they weren't looking directly at you. He sighed, took off his glasses and started massaging both of his temples with one hand. His hand was still hiding most of his face but the gesture still startled you, you felt an abnormal rush of anticipation wash over you. Your breath caught up in your throat and you couldn't help but stare at Dave.  
His head was resting in his hand, still hiding most of his face, finally he started moving it, slowly uncovering his face. Your gaze fell on a red iris, and then on a second. You met for the first time the tired red gaze of your neighbor. It was unusual but a lot of things about Dave were.

You were embarrassed but you truly wanted to take in the whole picture, after all Dave was objectively attractive and it would surely be the first and last time you would see him like this. 

When your gaze fell on his bruised lips you quickly redirected it on his eyes not thinking that heavy eye contact after staring at someone's lips could be easily misunderstood. 

“Look,” he started, sighing, “you are right.”

“Uh, I... am?”

“What my brother di- does to me is objectively awful.”

“Oh, yes, that is very true.”

He paused and sighed again. He looked so drained that it actually worried you.

“Tavros, you've lived through some shit,”

You smiled, that was one way to put it.

“but today you still helped me in a way I guess. Thanks.”

You weren't expecting that.

“Oh, really? Um, uhh are, are you sure? Oh wow, I meant, um, you're welcome?” 

You continued to make a fool out of yourself but Dave thankfully decided to ignore it and continued.

“Hey who knows maybe one day I'll even repay you by chasing off this Vriska person with my cool sword-fighting tricks.” He said, smiling.

You chuckled at that, Vriska was good at sword-fighting too but you appreciated the feelings. 

He looked at the ceiling for a while before putting back on his sunglasses. You didn't know what kind of face you made, but you earned a slow raise of the eyebrows from Dave. You looked at his plate and saw that he had finished eating. You suddenly remembered that you were supposed to show him where he was supposed to get cleaned up. 

 

“What? Disapointed?” You said, your face was once again neutral but you were fighting off a smirk.

Tavros cocked his head to one side, a smile on his face.

“Yeah, a little bit,” he said looking at you fondly, “but anyways since you've finished eating I need to show you our room!”

You swallowed, hard, having expecting him to become an embarrassed mess and especially not being able to retaliate this hard.  
Not only had he admitted being disappointed to not be able to look at your face, he had also mentioned the fact that the two of you would be sharing a room. Considering the literal adoration you saw on his face earlier as you removed your glasses, you were at a complete loss of words and worst of all you didn't actually know if he was indeed flirting. 

He looked at you, still smiling, patiently expecting you to start following behind him.

You cleared your throat and cursed internally.

**Author's Note:**

> hope you enjoyed!


End file.
